They have application in the cobordism ring in algebraic topology.
A multiplicative sequence is determined by its characteristic power series Q(z), and every power series with constant term 1 gives rise to a multiplicative sequence.
To recover a multiplicative sequence from a characteristic power series Q(z) we consider the coefficient of z j in the product for any m > j.
As an example, the sequence Kn = pn is multiplicative and has characteristic power series 1 + z.
Consider the power series where Bk is the k-th Bernoulli number.
The multiplicative sequence with Q as characteristic power series is denoted Lj(p1, ..., pj).
The multiplicative sequence with characteristic power series is denoted Aj(p1,...,pj).
The multiplicative sequence with characteristic power series is denoted Tj(p1,...,pj): these are the Todd polynomials.